Field of the Disclosure
Various features relate to encryption/decryption and digital signature generation, particularly asymmetric cryptography involving public and private keys.
Description of Related Art
Asymmetric cryptographic systems such as public key systems (also referred to as public-key/private-key systems) typically have advantages over other cryptographic systems in terms of key management and distribution. However, public key systems often may be computationally difficult and may involve large digital signatures. The key generation process may be computationally expensive. Accordingly, asymmetric cryptographic systems may require a powerful processor or may require additional processing time, which may cause delays, use more energy and/or drain batteries or other resources.
Furthermore, it is generally considered good cryptographic practice to have separate keys for different applications/protocols. In particular, if an asymmetric cryptographic system needs to receive encrypted messages and decrypt them, and also generate digital signatures, it is often advisable to have distinct keys for the two protocols. However, when using asymmetric cryptographic systems such as Rivest-Shamir-Adleman (RSA) systems, it is often too computationally expensive to generate two keys (e.g., in general twice as burdensome as generating just one key.) This can be especially problematic in embedded devices of key provisioning systems with limited resources, such as smartphones or the like. Note that herein, for brevity, the term key provisioning system generally refers to a system capable of generating and/or provisioning keys. It should be understood that, in practice, separate systems may be employed to generate the RSA keys while other systems provision the keys.
In view of the foregoing, it would be helpful to provide improved key generation and provisioning techniques and systems, particularly for use with embedded key provisioning systems.